Bride to Be
by Jeva
Summary: [One Shot - can be considered a prequel for Ten In One Odds] Preparations for a wedding can be an interesting experience. That is one thing Mouri Ran learns as she, her fiancé Kudo Shinichi, and their friends get ready for the big day.


_Author's Notes:_ -smirks- I'm proud of myself. I'm slowly coming up with stuff that I consider good. So this may be a warning that I will rewrite what I have of Ten In One Odds. Don't be surprised if I take the whole fic down either. Anyway, this is like one of the few stories I have that take place from a female's POV. I don't know why, but I find guys easier to write -shrugs- Anyway, hope you enjoy!  
  
_Disclaimer:_ I WISH I had the manga! ARGH! Especially MK manga! T.T! But I don't even own that! T.T!

* * *

  


**Bride to Be**

  
  
It was almost like a dream come true. It was spring. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and the wedding preparations were going without a hitch. Of course, that's what Mouri Ran thought to herself as she watched Hattori Heiji and her fiancé Kudo Shinichi bicker and argue over nothing at all. It was almost like magic how her life had come back together so solidly after all that had happened during the past two years. What with Shinichi's disappearance, the arrival of Edogawa Conan, the onslaught of fame for her father, and then--not too long ago--Shinichi's return and her discovery of who Conan had really been.  
  
Oh, she had been angry at him for a while, but there's only a certain amount of time one could ignore Shinichi and not forgive him. That's why when he had confronted her, looking more miserable than she had ever seen him, it had only taken ten minutes for her to get over it and another five to accept his proposal. She hadn't known it then, but he had made that proposal to help him remember he had something to come back to because, not but a minute after she accepted, he took off to finish the case he'd been working on. Uncovering the Black Organization--the group of people that had turned him into Conan when they'd wanted to kill him two years before.  
  
Again, she had been furious and would have not even looked his way again if he hadn't come back looking like he'd been dragged through hell along with Heiji and a detective named Hakuba Saguru. Shinichi had been adament about setting the date even in the state he had been in, which was why--not more than a month later--things were falling into place.  
  
She could hardly believe it was going so well.  
  
Suzuki Sonoko frowned as she looked at the paper on the clipboard she held, catching Ran's attention as she dubiously asked, "Are you sure we should invite these people?"  
  
Ran blinked in surprise at her friend, hurrying over and looking over her shoulder to see. It was a list she had been expecting. Shinichi's friends--Heiji and Saguru as well as a boy named Kuroba Kaito and the Detective Boys, her own friends, and both of their families were all invited. "Why?" she asked, oblivious to any problem with the invitations. "What's wrong with them?"  
  
Sonoko gave her a typical 'you must be joking' look. "Well," she said reasonably like a diplomat working in foreign affairs, "half of them are friends of Detective Boy..." She trailed off as she flipped up the first page to look at the second. She shook her head before continuing, "The other half is your families...and let's face it, neither of you have normal families."  
  
The bride to be laughed at her friend, waving her hand airily. "Don't be so mean, Sonoko," she said lightly, shrugging off what her friend had said. It was ridiculous that she was concerned over who they invited. It was their wedding, after all. "Everything will be fine."  
  
The sound of the word 'ahou' from Heiji brought her attention to her fiancé and his friend as they argued over the setting of--of all things--a piano. They both had a side of the baby grand and were each pulling in the direction they wished it to go in. It was an amusing sight, one that made Ran smile at how light-hearted it was. She sighed almost dreamily, "I can't believe this is really happening..."  
  
Sonoko snorted. "Me neither," she agreed, causing her friend to give her a narrowed-eyed look. The blonde stuck her nose into the air in a superior manner, however, and sniffed. "I mean, how are you ever going to fit into that dress of yours if you're playing around with him--"  
  
"SONOKO!" cried Ran, her face dark red from embarrassment at what Sonoko had implied.  
  
"What?" her friend asked with an innocent look, receiving a glare from the bride which seemed to make her revert back to a thoughtful look. "Also," she continued as if she hadn't said something that had caused such a reaction, "I don't know if it's such a good thing to have so many detectives in one area...especially if one of them is that one." She waved a hand at the two young men who were finally at some sort of a compromise.  
  
Ran frowned and placed her hands on her hips, giving off her annoyance in leaps and bounds. "Which one?" she asked, knowing which her friend was speaking of but daring her to admit it.  
  
Sonoko had always been one to speak her mind, however. "Your _man_," she insisted, starting to wave her arms. "He's a freakin' body-magnet!"  
  
"Oh, stop it," Ran said as calmly as she could, pulling her friend's arm down before it hit her in the face. "You know that's not true--"  
  
The blonde suddenly appeared right in her face with her finger pointed at her nose as she was given a challenging gaze. "Name once," she said quickly, "he hasn't been around during those murder cases."  
  
"..." Well, she couldn't argue against that.  
  
The thing was that Sonoko knew about the truth of Conan, too. She had been digging for something to pin on Shinichi just to show her friend just what a louse he was. She had been the one who had told Ran his secret before Shinichi could make it to her home. Apparently, she had followed Conan because she had overheard him speaking with Heiji about some Black Organization...  
  
And Shinichi did have a tendency to be near whenever there was a murder case...  
  
Sonoko backed off with a triumphant look. "See?" she asked before looking as if she had just realized something and was horrified by the thought of it. "And what if there's a stiff during your wedding? That would be _terrible!_"  
  
"_I know!_" cried Toyama Kazuha as she suddenly appeared beside the two young women. They both turned to her as she continued to rant, "And what if there was a chase scene or something? He would mess up his tux...or what if you're near the murdered person? You could ruin your dress!"  
  
Ran sweatdropped at how these two friends of hers could think up such things. "I'm sure nothing will happen--" she attempted to assure her friend from Osaka.  
  
Kazuha, however, exchanged a knowing look with Sonoko before looking to the bride with a serious expression. "I don't think your opinion counts in this," she said in a 'that is that' tone.  
  
"You are rather biased," agreed Sonoko with a shrug when Ran looked to her.  
  
Ran bit her lower lip, not wanting to accept what they were saying. "Well..." she began before trailing off, the sound of Heiji and Shinichi's bickering catching her attention again. They were fighting over where the piano should go again.  
  
"I've told you!" Heiji declared loudly from his side of the piano. "It should go here!" He tugged it in the direction he intended for it to go. Shinichi pulled back on it, however, looking ready to commit a murder himself.  
  
"Hattori," he began lowly before his voice grew in volume, "if you don't bring that stupid thing this way, I'm going to kick your head in!"  
  
"Hah! I'd like to see you try, Kudo! We're _both_ holding this thing! So you can't do anything about my complaining!" And that was true. He couldn't very well drop the piano and damage it. The large instrument did cost quite a bit, though it was from Shinichi's parents in America.  
  
The sudden appearance of a third young man sitting on top of the piano, eating pocky, made the bickering stop quickly as the weight became too much for either one of them to handle, and they quickly lowered it. Kaito stated cheerfully while the other two recovered, "I think this is the perfect place!"  
  
The two detectives looked to each other before nodding, reaching some sort of truce just before they pounced, falling onto the piano instead of Kaito, who merrily skipped away, laughing. The two of them quickly scrambled off of the piano and chased after the laughing, pocky-eating magician.  
  
Ran shook her head just as she registered the arrival of Nakamori Aoko. That explained where Kaito had been. It looked as if he and Aoko had just arrived. "Honestly," the newest woman in the gathering said, exasperated. "You'd think they were five-year-olds the way they behave."  
  
The bride laughed nervously with a large sweatdrop. "Well..." she said hesitantly as she gained the other three's attention, "I think it's good for Shinichi, really. He's been kind of down lately..."  
  
Rather than asking why he would be upset or depressed, Kazuha crossed her arms and huffed. "Heiji has no excuse," she claimed as she followed the chase between detectives and magician. "He's just an idiot."  
  
Sonoko slide up next to the young woman and elbowed her with a wink. "Which is why you're eyeing him like a piece of meat?"  
  
Aoko and Ran looked to each other with smiles before turning those smiles to Kazuha, who suddenly became red under the attention she was getting. She quickly bowed her head, looking to her feet as if that would hide her blush.'  
  
Aoko found this adorable and clasped her hands together with a starry-eyed expression. "It's so sweet that you two have someone!" she said to Ran and Kazuha.  
  
Again, Sonoko slid up to the young woman with a half-moon expression on her face. She didn't seem to believe that she was without a man herself. "Oh?" she asked incredulously. "What about Kuroba-kun?"  
  
"What about him?" Aoko asked, her face red and her tone hard and somewhat angry, though Ran couldn't tell if it was fake or real.  
  
"Well," she said instead of asking, "I always thought you two were..." She gestured vaguely, not quite sure how to word what she had thought the two were like. They reminded her of herself and Shinichi, although the situations were different. Oh, yes, very different, truth be told.  
  
"_What?!_" exclaimed the presently red-faced young woman. "Kaito?!"  
  
The sudden silence coming from the boys made the group of women turn to where the chasing had stopped. They all sweatdropped at the sight of Kaito holding Saguru by the shoulders as if he were using the third detective to ward of the other two. "They're trying to accuse me of another crime I haven't committed, Haku-chan!" he whined in a way a child would tell his parents that his siblings had taken his favorite toys. The pocky, Ran noticed, was mysteriously absent, probably hidden away on Kaito.  
  
Saguru looked back to the magician with a blank expression. "And what makes you think I'll stop them?" he asked before looking back to Heiji and Shinichi who were grinning at Kaito evilly. Saguru quickly stepped out of the way and the chased resumed as Kaito let out a squeak that would have seemed unintentional if one didn't noticed the large grin on his face as they ran up the stairs.  
  
"Oh, yeah," Aoko said suddenly in a bland, sarcastic tone. "That is one hunk of man."  
  
Kazuha blinked in surprise before looking up to the second floor of Shinichi's house with a hand shielding her eyes from the lights. "Wow..." she said in amazement. "They almost got him that time..."  
  
Sonoko laughed loudly at that. "Kuroba-kun is so fast that I doubt anyone could catch him," she commented lightly before looking to Kaito's childhood friend. "Slippery, isn't he?"  
  
The police investigator's daughter gave an evil grin. "Like a fish."  
  
Ran kept an eye on the three boys running around the house and frowned as Heiji and Shinichi hurried down the stairs again after Kaito somehow managed to slide down the handrail as if it were a slide. "I wonder who Saguru-kun's going to walk down the aisle..." she murmured to herself as she watched the blond young man watch the other detectives attempt another dog-pile, which the magician gleefully dodged.  
  
Someone cleared their voice, and the women turned to a serious-looking Sonoko, who stood there with her eyes closed.  
  
Aoko gasped. "You and Hakuba-kun!" she exclaimed in disbelief.  
  
Sonoko opened her eyes a little, a bit of pink on her cheeks as she said, "It's not like it's a date." She brushed some of her hair out of the way and looked to Kazuha. "Besides, Hattori-kun didn't want to walk with someone else, so he made Shinichi choose someone who was willing to walk down the aisle with someone else." Her eyes narrowed as if she dared one of the other three girls to say anything else about her walking with Saguru.  
  
They didn't, but Kazuha's face went bright red again. "Is that why he's not best man?" she said rather shyly, embarrassed by the idea that Heiji would do such a thoughtful and sweet thing.  
  
Ran smiled. "Wow..." she said, happy for her friend. "That's really sweet of him, Kazuha-chan!"  
  
Aoko, however, smirked and crossed her arms. "Naturally," she said as if she were ready to state something that was common knowledge, "Kaito was the last on the list for best man, right?"  
  
Sonoko blinked, surprised by the other young woman coming to this conclusion. "Why do you say that? He was actually the second choice."  
  
The inspector's daughter blinked before flushing as red as Kazuha had been. "Oh..."  
  
Ran smiled at Aoko, happy for her as well before she turned back to the chase that was still continuing. Now, though, the detectives were taking a more sophisticated approach. Even Saguru was in on it as they tried to box Kaito in.  
  
"FI-I-ISH! FI-I-I-I-ISH! FI-I-I-I-I-I-I-ISH!" Heiji shouted in a sing-song voice as Kaito attempted to skip toward the front door. Paling at just that simple word, the magician changed his mind and headed toward the stairs again (not before throwing some pocky at Heiji in retaliation), suspecting Saguru wouldn't try something as low as bringing up his fear of small water creatures.  
  
He was wrong. Saguru stepped in his path and gave him a smile that was a little scarier than fish were. "I think Nakamori-san's planning to put a koi pond in her backyard..." he informed the young man, who made a loud 'gah' noise of surprise before he hopped over the handrail and came face to face with Shinichi.  
  
Shinichi smirked wickedly. If anything, two years as a child had taught him how to get on people's nerves and how to push the right buttons. "_I LOVE FISHES 'CAUSE THEY'RE SO DELICIOUS!_" he bellowed in English.  
  
"_GONE GOLD FISHIN'!_" answered Heiji and Saguru, the blond's English coming out clearer than the Detective of the West's.  
  
Kaito seemed to go pale at the idea of eating a gold fish and bolted for the back door on the other side of the kitchen. The three detectives quickly followed, laughing at their success of making Kaito actually run rather than tease them.  
  
The women sweatdropped.  
  
"Well..." Ran said slowly, barely holding a pleasant smile on her face. This wasn't exactly how she pictured things going. "At least this will be fun--"  
  
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!" a woman screamed from outside of the house and what seemed to be across the street at the park.  
  
Sonoko and Kazuha both turned toward Ran with 'I told you so' etched into both of their features. Ran, however, just sweatdropped heavier and tried to shrug off the new development with a strained smile. "Maybe that was Kaito-kun?"  
  


* * *

_Author's Notes:_ -grins- So cute. I like this. I really do. Hope you did, too. Even though it wasn't the right story I should be working on. Oh, well. I wanted this thing posted! Hope you enjoyed! Ja! 


End file.
